Monday, Mar 4, 2024

BTC all-time highs, a new rates narrative, Nigeria chaos

“We tend to use a new technology to do an old task more efficiently. We pave the cow paths.” – Paul Saffo ||

Hello everyone!! Are you ready for this week? I have my voice back, so there is a recording today.

Programming note: I’m afraid there won’t be a newsletter on Wednesday, March 6, I’ll be away from my desk for a big part of the day. All the more to talk about on Thursday!

IN THIS NEWSLETTER:

• A twist in US rates expectations

• Significant all-time highs

• Nigeria thinks crypto can bring down the economy

If you’re not a subscriber to the premium daily, I hope you’ll consider becoming one! You’ll get ~daily insight into the growing overlap between the crypto and macro landscapes, as well as some useful links, and access to an audio read of the content.

WHAT I’M WATCHING:

A twist in US rates expectations

A new and intriguing narrative is starting to circulate: that the US Federal Reserve will not cut rates this year.

The discussion seems to have been kicked off by Apollo’s Torsten Slok, who posits that the US economy will be strong enough for the rest of this year to weaken Federal Reserve conviction that inflation will continue to decelerate. This has since been echoed by other analysts and is picking up steam, in part because of media coverage of such an audacious call.

But how audacious is it? Slok refers to the jump in US growth forecasts and the recent easing in financial conditions. He also flagged a tight labour market and sticky wage inflation.

While I’ve been saying for ages that I thought the market was running on hopium when it came to rates expectations, I’m going to respectfully disagree with Torsten here.